Big numbers —

iPhone 5 sales top 5 million during launch weekend

Demand continues to outstrip supply.

On Monday, Apple announced that the iPhone 5 topped its previous first weekend sales record of 4 million units set by the iPhone 4S last year. In just three days, Apple moved over 5 million units, the company said, despite some early preorders being delayed until October.

"Demand for iPhone 5 has been incredible and we are working hard to get an iPhone 5 into the hands of every customer who wants one as quickly as possible," Apple CEO Tim Cook said in a statement. "While we have sold out of our initial supply, stores continue to receive iPhone 5 shipments regularly and customers can continue to order online and receive an estimated delivery date."

The iPhone 5 launched on September 21 in US, Australia, Canada, France, Germany, Hong Kong, Japan, Singapore and the UK. The device was available to preorder beginning at midnight on September 14, and stock set aside for US preorders sold out in approximately one hour. Apple previously announced that customers had preordered over 2 million iPhone 5s within 24 hours.

I got my CC charged on Saturday, so I guess I count as a sale even though my phone won't arrive till later this week, and I had pre-ordered at 1:34am. My guess then is that the "5 million" number only includes the first 3 or 4 hours of pre-orders and that they are still processing the first week pre-orders.

Well some "analysts" expected almost 10 million sold over the weekend. But they're analysts so whatever they expected should be halved and then analyzed for sanity.

I don't think it's registered as a sale until the phone ships. Given that within the first 24 hours some phones were already being listed as into October (mine, as previously mentioned, was at 1:34am and shipped on Saturday), I think they only had 5 million on hand the first weekend.

So it's not hard to imagine Apple having 10m pre-orders, and by the first week (this Friday) having shipped a second set of 5m they will have "sold" 10m in a single week.

Got mine on day one Friday at my phone shop as part of my free update, ordered at the start of that week. Given the "pointless upgrade" comments going around for the last few days I didn't expect much from it but its fantastic, very happy with it.

I picked it up in store, upgrading from a 3y/o 3GS. The phone is fantastic and I am happy with it. I thought I'd be disappointed in the 4" screen size but I don't think I could use a larger screen one handed. The screen makes my wife's 4s screen look washed out in comparison due to a higher color gamut. The 4S screen is also inset a little further because of an extra layer of glass.

I compared it with my friends GS3 (apple hater) and his screen is awful and blue (why does no one report this?). The GS3 has significantly worse material quality than the 5 as well.

So it's not hard to imagine Apple having 10m pre-orders, and by the first week (this Friday) having shipped a second set of 5m they will have "sold" 10m in a single week.

I don't doubt that to be honest, I just find it ludicrous that Apple would sit on 10 million iPhones of inventory. Releasing as soon as you have enough to handle the initial rush and a decent production line makes more sense to me than the analyst "lets pull high numbers of sales out of our asses" logic.

Interesting, I walked over to my local Apple store (Burlington, Mass.) around noon on Friday to see when I might be able to get a phone and was able to walk in and buy a phone right then, no line, no waiting. Not all models from all carriers were available, but most, and the one I wanted was (32GB AT&T- I have grandfathered unlimited data). This did not seem like any previous launches - iPhone or iPad - with lines out to the street all day. They must have made alot of phones.

Got mine on day one Friday at my phone shop as part of my free update, ordered at the start of that week. Given the "pointless upgrade" comments going around for the last few days I didn't expect much from it but its fantastic, very happy with it.

I picked it up in store, upgrading from a 3y/o 3GS. The phone is fantastic and I am happy with it. I thought I'd be disappointed in the 4" screen size but I don't think I could use a larger screen one handed. The screen makes my wife's 4s screen look washed out in comparison due to a higher color gamut. The 4S screen is also inset a little further because of an extra layer of glass.

I compared it with my friends GS3 (apple hater) and his screen is awful and blue (why does no one report this?). The GS3 has significantly worse material quality than the 5 as well.

The screen thing is more complicated than that. The GS3 is bigger (which is bad if you want small, good if you want readable), 720p (which is good if you watch movies), squarer (which is good if you read), AMOLED (which is good if you read at night, I can't stand LCD's glow-in-the-dark effect). It does have amusingly wrong colors.

To me, colour "rightness" is a purely aesthetic concern, as opposed to all the other ones which are rather functional.

Same for the materials. Plastic is.. well, plasticy, but it does offer light weight, sturdiness (better than a glass back ^^), and cheapness (a 64GB iP5 is 900 euros, a 16+64GB GS3 is 600 euros, out of contract). I'd say materials are also an aesthetic concern. Formula one cars are not made of glass or aluminum, but of plastics ^^

I do agree the iP5 is a very nice object. If money is no object, aesthetics important, and you don't care about walled garden, maps, and interoperability, it's a good choice. Its camera is very good, too.

It's funny, the holy wars over desktop operating systems seem to be basically over; everyone concedes that the big three (Windows, Mac, and Linux) can all do what you want these days, but more importantly, I think people just don't care so much these days. On the other hand, the smartphone holy wars are escalating. Every thread about the iPhone has Android folks calling iPhone owners idiots, iPhone folks calling Android owners morons, and lots and lots of bombastic argumentation around basically trivial differences in features. But as the arguments heat up, the reasons to argue seem to diminish. The smartphone, as we know it, has pretty much converged on a certain form. They all look similar, operating in a similar sort of way, and the latest and greatest use more or less similar hardware.

To me, it seems like for second or third or greater generation smartphone owners, the best decision for an upgrade is simply to stick with the platform you have and get the latest and greatest available model, such that your existing library of apps will continue to work going forward. While lots of phones have a few unique and nifty features, I don't see anything out there so superior to it's competition to outweigh the costs of switching for most people. Maybe that's why the arguments are so hot, because people are so committed to their choice of platform; a bit like the early PC era when there were a few wholly incompatible platforms. But so far the market remains vibrant with competition between iOS and Android and will be moreso if Windows Phone can establish a significant and sustainable user base.

For a counter data point, my wife wanted one but was waiting for the initial wait times to go down. However, just in case, we decided to call Futureshop (Bestbuy) and Telus (in Moncton, Canada) Saturday and they were both fully stocked. She was able to walk out with an iPhone 5 in her choice of color. When we told the Telus saleswomen we were surprised we could get one this early, she told us they had a large amount in stock.

The screen thing is more complicated than that. The GS3 is bigger (which is bad if you want small, good if you want readable), 720p (which is good if you watch movies), squarer (which is good if you read), AMOLED (which is good if you read at night, I can't stand LCD's glow-in-the-dark effect). It does have amusingly wrong colors.

To me, colour "rightness" is a purely aesthetic concern, as opposed to all the other ones which are rather functional.

Same for the materials. Plastic is.. well, plasticy, but it does offer light weight, sturdiness (better than a glass back ^^), and cheapness (a 64GB iP5 is 900 euros, a 16+64GB GS3 is 600 euros, out of contract). I'd say materials are also an aesthetic concern. Formula one cars are not made of glass or aluminum, but of plastics ^^

I do agree the iP5 is a very nice object. If money is no object, aesthetics important, and you don't care about walled garden, maps, and interoperability, it's a good choice. Its camera is very good, too.

F1 cars are made of carbon fiber, not plastic And no carbon fiber is not a type of plastic.

Drop test have shone the iPhone 5 to do better than the GS3. The new all aluminum housing and front glass that doesnt stick out has made a big difference compared to the 4/4S. It is also a LOT lighter.

The screen is kind of user preference. But I personally dislike the horrible color of AMOLED displays.

Now that I think of it, I'm wondering if Apple isn't prioritizing retail customers over pre-orders. I guess it makes sense because they know they have the pre-order customers in the bag already and they might still have to win over the walk-in type customers. Especially given the fact that that in order to close a contract deal, carriers might suggest an Android device when iPhones are not in stock.

My wife was actually hesitating between an S3 and a iPhone5 (I have an S2 and she likes the big screen) so it is actually conceivable that Apple would have lost the sale if the iPhone 5 wasn't in stock. Ultimately she went with the iPhone so she wouldn't have to re-download and reconfigure all her apps and lose access to her iTunes TV shows and movies.

I got my CC charged on Saturday, so I guess I count as a sale even though my phone won't arrive till later this week, and I had pre-ordered at 1:34am. My guess then is that the "5 million" number only includes the first 3 or 4 hours of pre-orders and that they are still processing the first week pre-orders.

Yours wasn't counted. They are only counting it when you actually receive it (sign for it).the 5M is storefront sales + signed and delivered online sales. (And FWIW Apple's statement actually said "more than" 5M.)

I got my CC charged on Saturday, so I guess I count as a sale even though my phone won't arrive till later this week, and I had pre-ordered at 1:34am. My guess then is that the "5 million" number only includes the first 3 or 4 hours of pre-orders and that they are still processing the first week pre-orders.

Yours wasn't counted. They are only counting it when you actually receive it (sign for it).the 5M is storefront sales + signed and delivered online sales. (And FWIW Apple's statement actually said "more than" 5M.)

Not calling into question your statement, I'd just be curious to see where you got that information given that Apple (nor most companies) doesn't normally break things down so explicitly for the public, at least not in such a short time frame. Do you have a link?

Not this cycle, but I did walk into an Apple store the evening of the iPad 3 (new iPad? iPad HD? Whatever the current one is) with a friend, and he walked out with one.

They're doing a damned good job with the launches lately. Lines around the block make for good news, but devices in the hands of customers make for more sales. Plus, if you're a fan of lines around the block, you can usually get that if you show up early in the morning. They're surprisingly fun!

I have a cousin who works at the phone company that's gonna sell the iPhone in Mexico. So I have mine.... preordered? The moment these things come out he's gonna save one for me so I can finally replace my 3 years old 3GS.

No mention either that the Samsung GS3 had 9 million preorders before it even shipped. Or that it sold over 20 million units in its' first 100 days.

Yeah.."Eat it Samsung".

Considering that last year's iPhone saw 35m sales within it's first 100 days and then 37m the quarter afterwards, I'm not sure why a 9m pre-order or 20m sold is a big deal.

Apple hasn't announced it's pre-order rate other than 2m in 24 hours; that still leaves 5 days of pre-orders not mentioned. It hasn't been 100 days, either, and I would be surprised if Apple couldn't sell 50m iPhone 5 in 100 days, with the real limit being manufacturing capacity.

Samsung has a good phone, but it probably wouldn't have sold so well had it not looked so similar to the iPhone. We'll see how the GS3 holds up now that the iPhone 5 is available.

No mention either that the Samsung GS3 had 9 million preorders before it even shipped. Or that it sold over 20 million units in its' first 100 days.

Yeah.."Eat it Samsung".

Yes, they reported 9M pre-orders, but by the end of June, 33 days post-launch, they'd only sold 6M units. What happened to the other 3M pre-orders? Also, if they sold 6M in 33 days, that means Apple sold 83% as many units in 9% of the time.

No one is surprised that the iPhone 5 is selling well...that is a forgone expectation. What is key though is that it sold really well, but still short of analyst expectation...25% short of it.

I am sorry, this is only key to people who don't know the kind of track record these analysts have, in regards to this topic. I am not sure why people take them seriously, and I certainly wouldn't use them as a bullet point in my platform war talking points.